Senator Fuller Clark named Champion of Choice

PORTSMOUTH — The New Hampshire branch of the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League has named state Sen. Martha Fuller Clark as its 2014 Champion for Choice.

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By Joey Cresta

seacoastonline.com

By Joey Cresta

Posted Jan. 22, 2014 at 2:00 AM

By Joey Cresta
Posted Jan. 22, 2014 at 2:00 AM

» Social News

PORTSMOUTH — The New Hampshire branch of the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League has named state Sen. Martha Fuller Clark as its 2014 Champion for Choice.

NARAL Pro-Choice New Hampshire will recognize Fuller Clark, D-Portsmouth, at an event called "Roe at 41: Still Fighting for Choice" at an event in the Governor's Hall at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord tonight.

Laura Thibault, executive director of NARAL N.H., said the annual event is the organization's largest fund-raiser of the year and is always held around the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a woman's right to an abortion.

Thibault said Fuller Clark exemplifies pro-choice leadership and for decades has been a strong advocate for women's reproductive health.

"We're just so pleased to be presenting the award to Martha," she said. "She never backs down. She is always willing to speak up and be a voice for women in the state who don't have a voice."

NARAL N.H. will present a compilation of comments regarding Fuller Clark's efforts collected from some of the state's top women leaders, including U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and N.H. House Speaker Terie Norelli, D-Portsmouth, during the award presentation, Thibault said.

The guest speaker for the event will be Robin Marty, an activist, reporter and author of "Crow After Roe: How Women's Health is the New 'Separate but Equal' and How to Change That." The book details the tactics of anti-choice legislators to restrict access to abortion services.

Thibault said the fund-raiser is a way of bringing pro-choice supporters together to remind them that the fight is not over and to get them re-energized for another legislative session that will challenge women's health rights.

She said there is a bill in the N.H. Legislature this year that would establish that life begins at conception and another that would place "onerous" restrictions on clinics that provide abortion care in an effort to put them out of business.

"This is an issue that is not going away and it requires constant vigilance," she said.